What will baseball be like in the year 2044? If you said “umpires will use jet-packs, there will be minor league teams in Siberia, third basemen will be left-handed, female spectators will wear witches hats, and ‘The Detroit Bengals’ will be the most powerful team in baseball,” then get out of Jim Moore’s head, because back in the 50s he wrote a short story in which all of those things went down.

Oh, I should also mention, the star player for the Bengals was a fifth year player named Rocket Rigsby. If Bryce Harper plays until he’s 46, he could one day teach the rookie Rigsby a little bit about how Old School Baseball was played!

2044: 4 Wild Card teams in each league, starting pitchers go every 7th day, and 2 leagues both have 3 divisions of 7 teams each to assure constant inter-league play. Instant replay has not been expanded, unskilled umpires go undisciplined, one league has the DH and the other doesn’t, and Bud is promising to retire soon.